


could be you

by helloearthlings



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Childhood Friends, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Modern Era, One Night Stands
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-16
Updated: 2017-09-16
Packaged: 2018-12-30 08:13:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12104481
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/helloearthlings/pseuds/helloearthlings
Summary: “Merlin?” Arthur squinted at the ridiculously attractive, shirtless, twenty-something in front of him and tried to connect him with his toothy, scrawny playmate who would always fight kids twice his size on the playground. “I – I mean Emmett. Emmett Ambrose. You’re Emmett Ambrose?”“Fuck,” Emmett – no, it wasn’t Emmett, it wasMerlin– gaped at Arthur incredulously. "Holy shit."





	could be you

**Author's Note:**

> An idea I've had for a few days now that I've had some fun with. Super unedited because my neck is killing me and I want to go to sleep. I barely slept last night because I got to see John Mulaney who was fucking INCREDIBLE but now I desperately need to catch up on sleep.
> 
> Maybe there'll be another post this weekend? No promises, though, I have a creative writing class to keep up with, too. Hope you like this unfiltered fluff, though, and please comment if you do!

 

Arthur woke up to the sound of a phone dinging.

Conscious in an instant, he screwed his eyes shut and willed himself to ignore whoever was trying to reach him so that he could drift peacefully back to the land of no responsibilities, only the nice warm pillow and the –

The nice warm body Arthur suddenly realized that he had brushed up against.

It was then that Arthur realized the phone dinging hadn’t been his own.

He cracked an eyelid open to see the torso of another man, phone balanced precariously on his chest as he clicked it, presumably silencing it as he let it go lax in one of his long-fingered, spindly hands.

“Sorry,” the man croaked, his voice crackly and sleep-heavy but warm all the same. Arthur tilted his head up and remembered the previous night in flashes; the narrow dark-haired man in the club last night, how they’d danced but also talked; not about anything important, but about books they’d read and movies they’d seen and people they knew.

They had also come home together at the end of the night, and the other man had been awkward but charming, his laughter making up for both of their clumsiness as they tried to get each other off while altogether too buzzed for that kind of coordination.

“It’s okay,” Arthur said, and his voice sounded equally as rough. Recognizing the stab of pain that went through his neck when he turned his head, he regretfully sat up, cupping one side of his neck to snap it back into place.

He could practically feel the other man’s wince. “That sounded painful.”

Arthur shrugged, turning his head the other way. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the other man’s eyes lightly surveying him, something familiar to affection in them. Arthur suddenly felt self-conscious and quickly laid back down. The man turned to face him, a smile growing on his face

“Well, I haven’t vomited up any alcohol,” Arthur said, and unwittingly smiled back, “so I count that as a success.”

“You also succeeded in bringing someone home,” the man’s lips quirked up self-deprecatingly and Arthur laughed. “Congratulations.”

“Think that well of yourself?” Arthur teased, the awkwardness in his limbs slowly filtering away with the man’s easy nature.

“Well, I had fun,” the man shrugged, biting his lip, “so I have to figure it wasn’t a complete loss for you.”

“Not a _complete_ loss,” Arthur agreed, and the man snorted, shaking his head.

“God, you’re still a cocky prick even without the alcohol,” the man laughed, and Arthur got the feeling that it wasn’t an insult. “I should’ve went home with another Westworld fan.”

“But I’m the biggest Westworld fan,” Arthur argued, and for some reason, had the courage to push at the other man’s shoulder lightly. He usually wasn’t physical with someone he didn’t know.

Well. They’d been a lot more physical last night, but that should’ve only made this more awkward and cringe-worthy; instead, Arthur was kind of having fun.

“You’ve seen it three times,” the man asserted as fact and Arthur stared.

“How’d you –” Arthur started, then remembered a long debate over the moral code of Westworld inhabitants versus scientists versus ordinary civilians and how a different standard was held for each of them. It wasn’t typical club conversation, and it surprised Arthur beyond measure that they had managed to connect like that.

“I know so many things about you, Arthur,” the man waggled his eyebrows in a ridiculous fashion and Arthur shook his head shamefully, realizing that not only did the man remembered the night much better than Arthur, but he had also remembered Arthur’s name when Arthur couldn’t, for the life of him, think of something that vaguely resembled a conversation about names.

The Westworld conversation was coming back in full, however, and Arthur had a lot of new points to make about the subject. However, Arthur had to will his mind to stretch farther back into the evening.

“Like what?” Arthur said challengingly so that he could have time to think, mind worming its way through all of the night’s interactions. Though a name did not immediately present himself, Arthur found himself smiling as he remembered how much he’d fucking liked this guy.

“I know that I’m your first one night stand,” the man raised a cocky eyebrow and Arthur couldn’t help but blush at the insinuation. “Oh, don’t worry about it, you did fine. I’m very flattered to be your first.”

“And you bring someone new home every night, huh?” Arthur mocked right back, and the man’s eyes crinkled as he smiled.

“You would be my third,” the man said, biting his lip in a way that was both cute and suggestive; Arthur wondered how he did that, how many other guys he pulled that move on. “I don’t go to the clubs often enough to make a habit of it.”

“It was your friend’s birthday,” Arthur remembered, mind finally settling on their first conversation, next to the bar while Arthur was ordering himself and Morgana drinks and he’d first seen the man, next to another, longer-haired one in a birthday hat that had an obscene joke on it. The man had turned to Arthur and made a joke about his friend not being able to contain himself, and introduced himself as –

“Emmett,” Arthur blurted out, and the man squinted up at him, head tilted; Arthur cringed internally, wishing he could’ve kept his forgetfulness to himself. “I mean…that’s your name…Emmett is your name.”

“Emmett is my name,” the man answered, eyes soft around the edges, clearly not too offended by Arthur’s misstep. “Did _you_ know Emmett was my name before three seconds ago?”

Arthur’s blush clearly answered for him, but Emmett only laughed at him, his hand reaching towards Arthur’s to tangle with it. Arthur was struck with the easiness of the gesture, what Emmett was insinuating by it, the affection that was implicit in it.

“I had a good reason for forgetting,” Arthur argued, his mind now preoccupied with searching for a good reason. He found one as the name nagged him, poking him incessantly, reminding him where he’d heard that name before.

“Oh?” Emmett raised an eyebrow, judgement clearly present, but not one of _I’ll hate you and I won’t date you if you don’t have a good reason._ Arthur wondered why he cared so much about what Emmett thought of him, and then realized that he’d already flittingly thought of them dating in some upcoming future.

“Emmett’s the name of my best friend from when I was a kid,” Arthur explained, and Emmett’s brow furrowed. It made him look even cuter than he already was, and Arthur didn’t think that was fair. “But I never _called_ him Emmett because I was an overbearing kid who wanted a Merlin to my Arthur to play Camelot at recess. I never called him anything but Merlin, and now the name Emmett is permanently removed from my mind. Awful name you have, Emmett. Just awful.”

Arthur had been proud of his witty banter until Emmett sat up, his expression suddenly serious and calculating, his eyes running over Arthur’s body as if he had never seen him up until this point.

“ _My_ childhood best friend,” Emmett began, his voice taking on a strange and incredulous quality, “was named Arthur. And he always called me Merlin. Are you – fucking hell, are you Arthur Penn?”

Arthur shot up in the bed, a thousand memories of running through the forest behind his house when he was a kid, running and screaming with Merlin always half a step behind him, passing notes with Merlin in every class when the teacher wasn’t looking, sitting cross-legged on Merlin’s bedroom floor playing cards in the middle of the night because Arthur hadn’t wanted to go home.

“ _Merlin?”_ Arthur squinted at the ridiculously attractive, shirtless, twenty-something in front of him and tried to connect him with his toothy, scrawny playmate who would always fight kids twice his size on the playground. “I – I mean Emmett. Emmett Ambrose. You’re Emmett Ambrose?”

“Fuck,” Emmett – no, it wasn’t Emmett, it was _Merlin –_ gaped at Arthur incredulously. “Holy shit.”

Arthur couldn’t help it; he started to laugh. Loudly, incredulously, to the point where there were tears in the corner of his eye. Thankfully, Merlin had started to laugh along with him until they were both giggling messes, Merlin leaning against Arthur’s shoulder just briefly before pulling away.

“How’ve you…” Merlin shook his head, eyes screwed up in embarrassment, “… _been_?”

“Good?” Arthur laughed, still not sure if this was reality or not. “God, Merlin, I – I mean, Emmet –”

“If anyone can call me Merlin, it’s you,” Merlin laughed, shaking his head. “Not that it stops anyone else, of course. Everyone calls me Merlin. My friends call me Merlin. My boss calls me Merlin. My _mum_ calls me Merlin.”

“Well, maybe if you’d introduced yourself that way, I would’ve recognized you,” Arthur teased, and suddenly it made sense, this easy comfort between them despite not knowing – well, knowing – well, _kind of knowing_ of one another. “Or if you were still a scrawny little git. When’d you get so fucking fit?”

Arthur was delighted to see Merlin look away, cheeks tinted pink. “Yeah, well, maybe if you still had baby fat, I would’ve recognized you, too!”

“Come on, we were twelve when I last saw you, I’d gotten rid of most of it by then,” Arthur said good-naturedly with a shake of his head. It had been a contentious argument between the two of them, who had it worse with Merlin looking like a stick and Arthur decidedly not.

“You really hadn’t, but you were still cute,” Merlin smiled at him, and Arthur recognized his friend in there, the big-hearted idiot, who could do more than keep up with Arthur, but outstripped him every time. “God, I just thought to myself _I have to tell mum about this_ but what would I tell her? That I picked you up in a club? That’s so embarrassing, I can’t tell her that.”

“How is Hunith?” Arthur smiled affectionately at the thought of her. Arthur had never had a mum, but Hunith had been an excellent transplant from ages five to twelve, loving and caring in a way his father never would be.

“My one night stand’s asking about my mother,” Merlin said, throwing his hands up in mock despair that made Arthur laugh. “This is completely ordinary and not at all mind-boggling in any way. This is what happens after all one night stands. I don’t know if you knew that, Arthur, since I’m your first, but I promise that all one night stands end up being long lost friends when you wake up the next morning. My mum’s great, thanks for asking.”

“Long lost?” Arthur had meant to laugh and mock, but his voice had turned genuine and adoring somewhere between his mind and his mouth.

“I was crushed when you went to Eton,” Merlin shrugged, voice light and meant to brush the notion off, but the rawness of the emotion was hiding somewhere behind the façade. “I cried for weeks after you left.”

“My fucking father,” Arthur shook his head, trying not to grow angry at the mere idea of his father and his toxic influence, how much he had wanted Arthur to get out of the town he’d raised him in and grow up among his _contemporaries_ which obviously meant other members of the upper class. “He wouldn’t let me write you, I remember.”

“I remember the last time I saw you,” Merlin said, his voice small and wistful, “you were leaving the next day and you’d snuck over to mine…climbed in my bedroom window like you always used to…”

Arthur remembered. He’d been so upset, and felt so helpless to stop his life from changing irrevocably without his consent, his father’s icy demeanor and angry words suggesting that Arthur’s life would never be his own choice hanging in the gloom over his childhood home.

He had never liked his childhood home much anyway; it was always better at Merlin’s. With Merlin.

So he’d ran to Merlin, like he always had; only this time, instead of staying up to play cards, Arthur had cried and blubbered and begged Merlin to hide him in his closet to his father couldn’t find him. They were both old enough to know better, but young enough to hope.

“I’d never seen you cry before,” Merlin said, bringing Arthur back to the present, but his eyes were far away and still trapped in the past. “I cried at every movie and bruised knee, but you never did until then. I remember thinking I’d do anything to make you stop, make you stay…”

Arthur wasn’t sure when they started holding hands, who’s hand reached out and who grasped on tightly, but he had suddenly become aware of their fingers brushing against one another.

Their eyes met; Merlin’s eyes hadn’t changed at all. There was a certain kind of stillness in the room now, a heaviness, a driving force that brought them together.

Again, Arthur wasn’t sure when it started or who started it, only became aware that his hands were in Merlin’s hair, Merlin’s on his jaw, their lips meeting over and over again. It should’ve been awkward, weird, improbable, _impossible_ , but it wasn’t.

The laughter returned as they broke apart, Merlin’s eyes crinkling around the edges.

“Let’s – fuck,” Arthur shook his head ruefully, not adequately prepared for whatever was coming  next but heart pumping all the same. “Let’s get something to eat? Is that too presumptuous?”

“We got each other off last night,” Merlin said, enunciating each word, lacing them with light mockery. Arthur did keep forgetting about that. “And I mean – c’mon, Arthur, I think we have to like… _do_ this, right? I mean, I think we’d be doing this even if we were entirely different people who’d never met before. But…there has to be a reason we met again after, what, thirteen years? That’s not a coincidence.”

“Well, that’s a lot more presumptuous than what I said,” Arthur shook his head, but his mind was singing the praises of whatever this was, coincidence or not.

“Yeah, but do you _like_ presumptuous?” Merlin flashed him a grin, but Arthur could see the nerves, the insecurity, and knew they were reflected on his own face.

“Yeah, yeah, I do,” Arthur grinned widely. He couldn’t remember ever feeling this happy, this excited, this cared for by the universe’s hand leading him toward where he wanted to be.

“This is the end,” Merlin said with a dramatic sigh, “of anyone _ever_ calling me by my real name again. It’s always going to be Merlin now, I can feel it.”

“Yeah, but do you like the name Merlin?” Arthur asked, his grin now perpetual, somehow already knowing the answer.

Merlin looked at him from under long lashes, his eyes bright and mocking and wonderful. “Yeah. I like the name Merlin. Good call, five year old Arthur.”

“Thanks,” Arthur said proudly, glad to take credit for it. “So really, it’s not the end of anything. It’s the beginning, right?”

“The middle,” Merlin corrected lightly, reaching for Arthur’s hand, “but it feels a bit like a beginning, too. We get to know each other all over again.”


End file.
